Re: First timer: Finder Copy vs. cp
Re: First timer: Finder Copy vs. cp
- Subject: Re: First timer: Finder Copy vs. cp
- From: Steve Checkoway <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2006 19:55:18 -0700
Dan Shoop wrote:
At 1:25 PM -0700 8/11/06, Steve Checkoway wrote:
Peter Bierman wrote:
At 2:36 AM -0700 8/11/06, Michael Smith wrote:
In particular, note that this is a new file; it is semantically
incorrect (regardless of your expectations otherwise) to mis-label
the file as having been instantiated at any time other than when it
was.
The "creation date", as understood by 22 years of Mac users, is the
date that the CONTENTS of the file were created.
In the 15 years I've been using a Mac, I never cared about the date
the contents of a file were created. I'm curious what people use this
for?
:really incredulous look:
Uh oh. I'm really very sorry. I didn't realize this was such a touchy
subject.
Keeping track of when a file was first created of course!
Yes, I got that.
This comes in handy if say, I have a bunch of documents in a
folder/directory and I want them sorted by when they were created, not
last modified, copied, backed up or munged. I simply enter list view and
click the "Creation Date" column and they're sorted. Likewise I can look
a a file's creation date and determine when the document was created. I
might have two different files name "Christmas List" floating around and
I want the one I created in 1997, not the one from last year.
Or I might have a bunch of pictures I took in a folder and I want to
find the ones I took back in 2001 on vacation. I might have edited
sometime later, but the modification date wouldn't reflect when I
captured those files. If I copied the photo to another volume I still
want to know when it was created, not when it was copied.
But do you do this?
Whole utilities exist to affect exactly this in the Finder such as
http://www.publicspace.net/ABetterFinderAttributes/ and is further
reinforced that people seem to expect this behavior such as this user
http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/resources/appledoubledates.html
If these utilities exist, what is the problem?
This behavior is in current use by *millions* of Mac users daily,
perhaps not you or the recent unix converts. Theses Finder users don't
normally find this behavior disturbed b/c they rarely venture into a
shell and just copy their files using the Finder. Those that do wonder
WTF happened to their dates as we see repeatedly in various forums where
they "warn" users against "un-Mac like behaviors" when copying files
that cause these dates to be lost.
Millions, huh? That aside, I you seem to be lumping me in with some
recent UNIX converts. As I've said, I've been using a Mac for 15 years.
For some perspective. I was 8 at the time we had our first computer, a
Mac Plus. It was not until my senior year of university that I ever used
a non Mac-UNIX.
Now I myself use various OSen, many others which also harbor the concept
of a file creation date, and while it may be hard for unix-heads to get
a grip on, users on OSen that support the concept find it extremely useful.
It's not hard to get a grip on. I don't think anyone is confused. The
idea of using the creation date for backup utilities confused me, I'll
admit. Say I create file 1 in some folder. Then I create file 2 in some
other folder. Now, my backup software runs and makes a backup of file 2.
Next, I delete file 2 and copy file 1 into its place. The backup runs,
looks at the creation date and since it was before the one in the
archive, it doesn't bother to back it up. That seems wrong.
The file, as a filesystem object, is irrelevant to the user. The user
cares primarily about the contents.
You've never sorted a set of files by modification date? Or used `find`
to search for all the files by a given owner? Or cared about file
permissions or ownerships? Clearly file metadata is used by users and
sysadmins routinely.
Modification date, yes. All by a given owner, yes. File permissions and
ownership? Only when I have my sysadmin hat on.
However even if you don't care about file dates and choose to believe
that they're of no use to users this is just an opinion, and one that is
empirically disproved if you'd talk to typical Mac/Finder users. Like
this guy:
http://systemsboy.blogspot.com/2005/11/file-creation-dates-hosed-copying-from.html
who obviously expects them to be maintained always anytime files get
copied, to his chagrin. Or this person:
http://www.febooti.com/products/filetweak/online-help/file-creation-date.html
I _never_ said that. I merely asked what some of the uses are. I'm sure
people have legitimate uses for it.
Moreover it fails the "Mom Test", when a user sees "creation date" in
the Finder what do you think they suspect that means? The last time the
file was copied/touched or the time the file was created? Ask your Mom
what she think that means. Try to convince Steve Jobs that it means
"when the file was last copied", I doubt you'd win.
I'm not sure what my Mom would think. I can ask her.
Heck, even Apple suggests users use this:
http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/finder/
Moreover opinions and philosophies of yourself of current Apple
Engineering withstanding, the Finder, which is the prime user interface
of concern on the Mac, does maintain, utilize, display and present file
creation dates and defines an expected behavior for file copying, namely
that creation date is preserved during copies.
I gave no opinions or philosophies.
It's incredulous to believe that anyone would posit that 'the Finder's
had this all wrong' for 22 years.
I didn't.
Clearly creation dates on the Mac, as expressed through the Finder,
*the* human user interface of concern, are to be maintained.
That unix and BSD is doesn't isn't surprising as it has no concept of
creation time *at all*. The closest if btime, which isn't a files
creation date but what you and others seem to suggest should be the
behavior during a copy, namely the inode allocation time of a file.
I have suggested nothing.
Simply put, Mac creation dates are a concept without any analogous time
metadata in the unix world. However this doesn't mean it's acceptable to
clobber it just because it's ignorant.
Nor did I say it was.
I agree. Unless the creation date is part of the contents of the file
(and it usually isn't), I sure don't care about it.
You don't have to, but others do. Daily.
I realize that. It's why I asked.
Moreover *this is the behavior of the Finder and the Macintosh since its
inception*. F%#king with it flies in the face of how the Mac user
interface is designed to function.
I didn't suggest doing any such thing. I believe you have put words into
my mouth.
The only application I see that you've mentioned is sorting your photos
by date, even if you copy them. It would never occur to me to do such a
thing because I would have put them in folders with the dates clearly
labeled so that when I sort the folders by name, it's all in order. That
said, it seems like a legitimate use. Not one I would use as an argument
for ensuring that creation date is inviolable.
--
Steve Checkoway
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